unRaid USB Drive: Is there a better option? 3rd USB Drive failure in 17 months.

[Storx]

Hello All,

I am curious if there is a better option than using a USB drive? I have been only using unRaid since 10/13/2020 and I'm going through my 3rd USB drive failure... This will be 3 USB drives in 17 months..

I started off using a brand new (Samsung 64GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive Fit (MUF-64BB/AM)) and installed the trial version of unRaid to play around with it on my gaming PC. In the first 30 days i had an issue with the server not booting off the USB drive anymore randomly. So since i was happy with unRaid outside of that issue i ordered parts to build a dedicated unRaid server with a new USB drive. So i bought (SanDisk 32GB Cruzer Fit USB 2.0 Flash Drive - SDCZ33-032G-G35) after asking for recommendations from the community and telling me a USB 2.0 drive was better to use than a 3.0 drive and many mentioned this drive was the one they used. Server was doing well for a few months, i was invested in unRaid at this point and out of the blue the USB drive stop booting again, but this was on completely different hardware than the first computer i tested unRaid on. I couldn't get the USB drive to format and allow me to install unraid on it again.. so started over with a brand new USB drive.. So i bought another USB drive listed from my old recommended suggestion post i asked and bought (SanDisk Ultra 16 GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive ‎SDCZ48-016G-U46) which was installed July of 2021. Now today, i am getting a banner that the drive is failing or corrupted and the server is down and none of my VMs or Dockers are running. This is the first time it failed and I'm getting an error with the server still running, so im assuming its another USB drive failure, but i cant just keep chucking USB drives at this every few months, this is getting really annoying.

 

1) Samsung 64GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive Fit (MUF-64BB/AM) = This USB drive was used on my Gaming PC only, it was restarted often as i used the PC mainly for windows for gaming while i played around learning about unRaid.

 

2) SanDisk 32GB Cruzer Fit USB 2.0 Flash Drive - SDCZ33-032G-G35 = This USB drive was restarted often, because i didn't leave the server on 24/7 and only used it when needed to write/read stuff from the storage drives. This was only used on the new NAS build, which was all brand new parts running on intel 10100/ ITX mobo in an Fractal Design R2 NAS case

 

3)SanDisk Ultra 16 GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive ‎SDCZ48-016G-U46 = This USB drive was used on the same hardware listed under drive #2, I started leaving the server on 24/7, because i was told the constant restarting of the server was the reason for Drive failure 2. So this USB drive was only powered down like 2 or 3 times over its lifetime. 

 

unRaid server is plugged into 1500VA APC UPS BN1500M2 and directly wired via Ethernet. No wifi antennas or connections. 

 

My question is what is the best plan of action for me going forward? 

 

 

Edited March 7, 2022 by Storx

[Storx]

Well.. it turns out my issue was not a failing flash drive apparently... Someone messaged me and informed me their is a bug with Unassigned Drive app update recently, that would grab the unraid boot drive and cause the server to drop into a massive error state, displaying tons of read errors on the flash drive. They informed me that when it updated randomly for my server, it caused this bug and all i needed to do was delete UD and restart the server, which i did and it booted up as if nothing ever happed displaying 0 errors now for the unRaid boot flash drive.. with good smart report..